About this blog

In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire ... The A-Team.

This was the introduction to one of the great TV series of the eighties. The purpose of this blog is to build up the definitive episode guide to the show across its five seasons which ran from 1983 to 1987. So this isn't too much of a burden, I'm intending to watch a couple of episodes a week and given that there were around 100 episodes made during its run, this will turn into a year-long project!

Face “hires” the team to help his high school sweetheart who is now a nun in an orphanage in Ecuador that has been over-run by bandits.

Another solid episode from writer Greyhosky, unremarkable in terms of its action but excellent in the way it deals with the relationship between Face and Leslie. This is one of Benedict's strongest episodes in any season. The scene on the plane in which Face speaks to Amy about his high school romance with Leslie is one of his best and the subsequent scenes with Markie Post are both touching and believable. Greyhosky always wrote good dialogue, in evidence here when Murdock refers to Leslie leaving Face to become a nun, (“Boy, when they said she'd run off with another guy they weren't kidding!”). There's also a great moment when the team respond to BA's moans about being drugged and flown to Ecuador with a collective “Be Quiet!”.

The later stages of the episode are more standard and less interesting as the team head off the bandits only for them to return in greater numbers. The action isn’t badly staged but there are so many good moments in the first half (including a scene in Face’s apartment that highlights the camaraderie among the team) that the second half suffers in comparison. It’s not an episode that will appeal to every fan but being very relationship-driven makes it different from the norm and that is what makes it memorable. Besides, any episode that has Murdock dressed as a nun can't be all bad. 8/10.